This invention relates to a paper feeding apparatus, especially to the paper feeding apparatus used with a collator or a printing machine.
As is known in the art, the paper feeding apparatus is intended to feed paper sheets one by one from a stack of paper sheets on a paper supply shelf into a machine such as a collator or a printing machine. In the paper feeding appartus, the paper sheets are commonly picked up from the top sheet of the stack, so that even thin paper sheets can be fed smoothly, but it would be necessary to gradually lift the paper supply shelf as the paper feeding operation proceeds.
For this reason, a special driving means for lifting the paper supply shelf has to be provided, and it is necessary to provide a sensor and a control section in order to control the position of the paper supply shelf, which makes the arrangement of the apparatus more complex and expensive.
Instead of lifing the paper supply shelf, it would be contemplated to lower it as the paper feeding operation proceeds. In this case, the structure of the apparatus would also be complex, not suitable for common use.
Another method of feeding paper sheets is to withdraw the lowest paper sheet while fixing the paper supply shelf in position. However, according to this method, thin paper sheets cannot be handled, nor is it possible to stack a large amount of paper sheets.